Innovations - Previous Blog on Financial Post

Here's a previous blog entry that I thought I would re-post on the Doctor, Heal Thyself blog. I asked the question at the time if there were any thoughts on the reasons for IT and healthcare being the two front-runners.

The article that I referenced was about the greatest innovations of the past 30 years. The criteria were:

• Did it improve quality of life, having a direct and/or material effect on quality of life?
• Did it address a compelling need? solve a compelling problem?
• Was it a fresh breakthrough with a "wow" factor?
• Did it change the way business is conducted?
• Did it increase the efficiency of how resources are used?
• Did it spark an ongoing stream of new innovations on top of the original innovation?
• Did it lead to the creation of a vast, new industry?

Any thoughts? Are these criteria reasonable? Any arguments on the selections?